There are over 130,000 children in the foster care system in the United States today. Many children would find permanent home and loving families, if only those parents knew they could afford to care for the children.
Just when you thought you could not afford to adopt, knowledge comes to the rescue. With the costs of private and international adoptions skyrocketing, one might think special needs adoption would be the same. Surprise, it’s not! In fact, in most cases, the adoptive parents receive a subsidy per child to help for their daily needs.
What is a subsidy?
It’s a monthly payment, paid to the adoptive parents, for the daily needs of a child. These payments vary, depending upon the needs of the child. It doesn’t matter how much you make, the child can still qualify. The amount is different from state to state. You can find out payment amounts here: http://www.nacac.org/adoptionsubsidy/stateprofiles.html
Adoptive parents can also be reimbursed for something called nonrecurring adoption expenses. The amount of this reimbursement also varies from state to state. Items included in this can be the cost of lodging to visit your child, transportation, meal costs, court costs, and attorney fees involved for paying the lawyer, etc. You pay these costs up front in most cases, and are reimbursed after the adoption is finalized. The reimbursement is on a per child case. For example… you adopt a sibling group of four, and the state reimbursed up to $2000 per child. You spent a total of $4,308 for everything involved in the adoption. Meals, traveling there, the gas, the motels, the attorney’s fees, etc. If you have the receipts, you should get every bit of that back. In essence, this is what makes these adoptions free. That figure is high, by the way. It doesn’t cost that much to adopt, that’s just an example of how the reimbursement works. There is no cost for the homestudy either.
In many states, the county which has custody of the child or siblings will offer something called Transportation Costs or Transportation Help.
What this means is that if you live far away from the potential adoptive child or children, the county will transport the child to your home for visits. If you live out of state, this can be very beneficial to the children and you.
Many would-be adoptive parents do not know that they can receive a monthly subsidy and medical assistance for children in the foster care system. With the help of the media, and the late Dave Thomas, word is getting around about Special Needs Adoption.
You can afford to adopt. If you have a home, rented or owned, and have a room for the children, you can do it. Open your heart and home to a child.
